Elder Andrew Peña:

Jan. 5, 2009
Hey Yall!!! First off, last Monday was great. We thought we were going to have tons of time because we weren't going to go shopping so we tried to find a car wash place closer to our apartment. There was none so we wasted 15 minutes looking and ended up going to Wal-mart and everything anyways! so we wasted time! :) I don't think I even wrote a letter last week! We went and played basketball and it was good, there is like 10 missionaries and 5 other people! Its tons of fun! One of my old companions, Elder Eden, who is the huge 6'5" guy who plays football and weighs like 300 pounds, well he was not on my team and long story short he elbowed me in the mouth and hit my teeth! I thought I was going to lose them! ( again ) so basketball was intense and my teeth still hurt a little but the good news is they are still there!!! Tuesday I went on an exchange with a missionary in my district who is from Utah and we did some service. We helped some members move and then helped some other ones do sheet rocking! Its been a while since I've done it but it was fun and brought back memories of me working at my old job!! Wednesday we had a district meeting and it went good, we had a baptismal interview for our investigator and he passed and then we went to see tons of members that afternoon. We had to be in our apartment by 6:00 pm for the rest of the night because of crazy people. Thursday we had some good appointments and with some investigators and nothing exciting Friday. We had weekly planning and went to visit lots of people in the afternoon and in the evening we called a part member family and asked the husband (who is the non-member) and asked if he would take us out cause we had no one to go with us. So he took us out for the evening and we went back to his house and taught the first lesson. It went well but he is still kinda in his ways and doesn't want to get baptized so we are trying. Saturday we tried to get a lot of sit down lessons and all of them fell through and everyone we talked to was again grumpy and mean now that Christmas is over. People are back to themselves again. We talked to this Baptist lady and I asked her what she liked about her church and you could tell she was thinking of something good to say so she smiles and looks at me and says the fact that its the same church that Christ established on this earth! and before she said this previous in our conversation she said her church was a reformed church and what not so my response to her was... "well isn't that was most people believe their church is" and she was like oh yeah well yeah so i said "Christ's church has to be a restoration not a reformation and that's why we believe in the restored gospel of Jesus Christ not reformed" she ignored us and continued to be grumpy and mean so we just walked away! So Saturday kinda stunk but Sunday was the BEST!! We had good church meetings and the testimonies were good. We had a meeting with the zone leaders and the stake president to discuss things about our mission and how we can work with our wards better. It was tons of fun and I learned so much. I love it! After that we had a quick dinner and we had a baptism at 6:00 pm and it went so good. Me and my companion were witnesses and the zone leaders taught the plan of salvation. Sunday made the rest of the week and on Tuesday we should be setting another baptism date with a part member family, she is nine years old but she is ready for baptism. It's sooo awesome. I would love to hear from everyone. I'll try to do better in my updates. Elder Peña

Jan. 12, 2009
I have limited time this week. Nothing exciting happened this week, we had transfer calls on Saturday. We ran into one crazy guy this week and he was drunk and he was like 5 inches close to my face and was talking about how he found God in jail and he had a beer in his hand and all sorts of stuff and how he is going to a church now so we invited him to our church and he said he would come but he was a no show. I think he was to drunk to remember. Last night was my last night in Modesto 6th ward and we had a stake priesthood meeting at 7:00 in the morning and all us missionaries in the stake sang at it. It was great. We had to wake up at 5:00 to get ready, it was foggy and dark. We had church and it was good. The guy who was baptized last Sunday was confirmed. Then we had three stakes combine at a stake center in Turlock where I was on my second transfer and had my 3rd zone conference and all my district meetings so it brought back lots of memories. Saturday President Gonzalez called me at 11:30 and asked me to be a zone leader with Elder Simmons who is from (Mudlake) West J whatever you call it. He played football with Kaleb and Sheldon or he knew them and I went on an exchange with him this last transfer so now he is my new companion starting Wednesday. I'm sooo excited to learn from him. He is an awesome missionary. We got a baptismal date for January the 24th so that's awesome and this Friday we will be having my first zone council meeting with the president and assistants. It will be something new for me so I'm excited to learn. In a couple days I'll have 15 months left to go. It has gone by so fast. CRAZY! Man its good to hear from all of you and to know you are all doing good. I miss you all and love you too! :) This Gospel is soooo true and you will be so blessed by living it!!! I love it and continue to pray for me daily.:) I went on two exchanges this week and it was good, learned lots and met a lot of people and had TONS of spiritual experiences, I loved it! My testimony continue to grow daily. The companionship I worked with this week are kind of struggling. One has issues with obedience and waking up on time and exercising in the morning, nothing that can't be fixed. I'll be a zone leader in Modesto covering the 4th ward and 1 branch-a singles branch. I'll be in church till like 5 o'clock though. But its good. I love this Gospel, its amazing. I cannot wait to hear from you all again. Love you so much and take care, Elder Peña